Speakers

Zoe Lyons

2018 - Entry Level Human

Since emerging on to the stand-up scene in 2004, the award winning Zoe Lyons has toured the world “Renewing our faith in stand up”. She is a regular on the comedy circuit and has appearing on Live at the Apollo, Mock the Week, Survivor! and most impressive of all, won Celebrity Mastermind!!

We’re delighted to have Zoe with us at OffGrid this year, catching her before her next nationwide tour “Entry Level Human”

Beavertown

2018 - The Story Continues... 1 year on

Britain’s coolest brewery, recently sold a minority stake to Heineken.

The move will increase production tenfold, create 150 new jobs and arguably allow Beavertown to fulfil it’s dreams … but some fans bemoan the deal, calling it a sell out. Creative Director Nick Dwyer is back with Kamilla Hannibal, who has steered the company’s community, to look at what the transition really means – accompanied by their latest appointment – Dame Melba Phantom.

Sherry Coutu

2018 - Going from start-up to scale

Research shows that fewer than 3% of start-ups both survive for a decade and enjoy a single year of high growth. The problem now is not the quantity of entrepreneurial activity in the UK, but the ability to turn that activity into high-growth scale-ups

All too often businesses collapse because of a pursuit of growth at all costs. Without a long-term, sustainable strategy, a relentless focus on innovation and the appropriate support and guidance at the critical times, failure can too easily occur – regardless of how good the business proposition might be.

Bringing a wealth of experience and real life pragmatism, Sherry Coutu CBE will talk about her experience and insight in how you take a business from start-up to scale up, as well her continuing work in bridging the gap between education and industry.

Sherry Coutu CBE is a serial entrepreneur, former CEO and angle investor and non executive. She is also CEO of Founders4schools.

Gundeep Anand

2018 - How to crush dream crushers

Founder of the The Last Stand street football competition, Gundeep Anand, realised local communities and postcode gangs had more in common to bring them together than divide them. Through the power of football and music and a platform to come together, Gundeep realised social purpose and new perspectives soon replaced rivalries and disillusionment. Gundeep works as a photographer, film director, coach and mentor and will be talking about how we crush the dream crushers that try to stop us all.

Gundeep is a Director and photographer from West London, whose passion is community and socially led projects. Having been involved in a variety of roles from Civil Engineering to sports coaching, Gundeep’s life was changed when his passion for promoting social change for good and filmmaking collided and he was able to make a film for Coca Cola’s StreetGames initiative, leading him on to establishing The Last Stand.

Sam Leith

2018 - Rhetoric. Giving words power

Sam is an author, journalist and the literary editor of The Spectator.He has published six books and is a regular contributor to the Evening Standard, The Guardian, Wall Street, Journal and Prospect.

Sam, a self-self-confessed rhetoric geek, will cover the history and basic techniques of rhetoric, and discuss how, as the communicative landscape has changed, so has the art of persuasion. With the rise of post-truth, social media and the peculiar and dangerous effectiveness of Trumpism, Sam will ask: can a fuller understanding of how rhetoric works offer some old solutions to new problems?

Pam Warhurst

2018 - The Incredible Edible Network

Pam Warhurst CBE has been an activist and advisor for over 40 years. She has been involved in local politics and national policy as the Chair of the Board of the Forestry Commission, which advises on and implements forestry policy in Great Britain.

Pam cofounded Incredible Edible, an initiative begun in Northern England dedicated to growing food locally by planting on unused land throughout the community, she called it propaganda gardening.

Incredible Edible encourages community engagement through local growing. It started small, with the planting of a few community herb gardens in Todmorden, and today has spin-offs in the U.S. and Japan, counting over 100 groups in the UK and 600 world-wide. Incredible Edible empowers ordinary people to take control of their communities through active civic engagement, redefining prosperity through the power of small actions.

Today Pam chairs the Incredible Edible Network, supporting and amplifying the work of groups around the UK, she also chairs Pennine Prospects which works with local authorities, government agencies, businesses, voluntary organisations and the local community to deliver a range of initiatives including the objectives of the “Heritage Strategy for the South Pennines”.

She is currently developing an expression of Incredible Edible across the Northern Power House called Incredible North and works as part of a global network of social entrepreneurs, as an Ashoka Fellow.

Jamie Bartlett

2018 - People vs Tech - How the internet is killing democracy (and how we save it)

Jamie Bartlett is an exciting British writer and journalist and one of the world’s leading thinkers on how radical thinking, technology and culture intersect. He was one of the first journalists to report on the workings and potential impact Cambridge Analytica was having on the US election and more recently presented BBC’s documentary ‘Secrets of Silicon Valley’

Having spoken in the past at OffGrid, Jamie is back in 2018 to talk about his latest work ‘People vs Tech’ and the impact (and potential threats) technology is having on our political systems. Jamie will look at how our fragile political system is being threatened by the digital revolution, explaining that by upholding six key pillars of democracy, we can save it before it is too late. We need to become active citizens; uphold a shared democratic culture; protect free elections; promote equality; safeguard competitive and civic freedoms; and trust in a sovereign authority. He will argue that the stakes couldn’t be higher and that, unless we radically alter our course, democracy will join feudalism, supreme monarchies and communism as just another political experiment that quietly disappeared.

June Sarpong

2018 - Six degrees of separation. Because the world is separate enough

In troubling times, it’s tempting to retreat to our comfort zones, to be with people just like us. But what if actively seeking the unfamiliar was proven to be the key to a brighter future – both personally and for society at large? In this fierce, empowering call to arms, Sarpong uncovers how a new approach to how we work, learn and live can help us reach our maximum potential, lessen the pressure on the State and solve some of the most stubborn challenges we face.

June has enjoyed a 20-year career which has already seen her become one of the most recognizable faces of British television, as well as being one of the UK’s most intelligent and dynamic young hosts. June is a media phenomenon and is the only host of her generation that is equally comfortable interviewing politicians, celebrities and members of the public.

June has also taken on the world’s most challenging live audiences, hosting 2005’s major Make Poverty History event in London’s Trafalgar Square and presenting at the UK leg of Live Earth in 2007. In 2008 alongside Will Smith she also hosted Nelson Mandela’s 90th Birthday celebrations in front of 30,000 people in London’s Hyde Park.

Mr Bingo

2018 - Alternative ways to make a living

Mr Bingo (so named as he won £141 at Gala Bingo when he was 19) was born in 1979. In 1980 he started drawing. There wasn’t a lot to do in Kent.

In 2011 he began the project Hate Mail, where people paid to receive offensive hand drawn postcards, selling out in days. It has been opened up 12 times since selling out in minutes. Mr Bingo had his postcards published by Penguin Books in 2012 and 2015 ran a kick starter campaign to fund a high-end art book of his Hate Mail illustrations, receiving backing from 3,732 backers in just 9 hours and is still the most successful Kickstarter for a book in the UK ever.

Having worked as a successful illustrator for 15 years, working for, amongst others, The New Yorker, The Guardian, Time, CH4, and The New York Times, in 2015 Mr Bingo made a decision to stop working for clients and go it alone as ‘some sort of artist’.

Nobody really knows how he makes a living now but somehow he does.

Mr Bingo will be talking about alternative ways to make a living.

Paula Zuccotti

2018 - Everything we touch - A 24 hour inventory of our lives

Paula Zuccotti is a photographer and ethnographer. She is also the author of the best-selling book Every Thing We Touch where she asked 62 people from 6 continents and different ages, cultures, professions and economic backgrounds to gather every object they touched in 24 hours. From a toddler in Tokyo to a cowboy in Arizona — they all took part in documenting their personal possessions. Paula then captured their stories by beautifully arranging their objects together in a single frame. The book was such a global success that two companies commissioned Paula to create ad campaigns inspired by her book: automotive giant Skoda’s ‘Loved Not Owned’ and Lloyds Bank‘s ‘My Favourite Things’.

Every Thing We Touch is now travelling the world as a live performance, most recently in Jerusalem, where she created visual diaries by all the major religions in the region. By collecting these intimate objects, coupled with her 15 yrs experience as an ethnographer, Paula has become the go-to expert for the likes of Google, Starbucks, Nike, LG, Microsoft, Disney, Ikea and many others. Her user-centric methodology is fundamental to unearthing meaningful innovation and this has enabled Paula to have insights and a perspective on every sector.

Joe Macleod

2018 - Why we overlook endings and why we shouldn't

As consumers and providers we overlook the importance of healthy, coherent endings.

There was once a rich culture of reflection and responsibility, but over recent centuries this has been lost. Producing a mixture of long term societal oversight, and short term denial. We are left with a bias customer lifecycle that is limited to the exciting vocabulary geared strictly around all things new. Giving rise to guilt-free consumers, an overly-blamed business sector and a society which finds itself at a loss when it needs to grapple with responsibility and consumptions biggest ills.

Joe Macleod will be looking at why we overlook endings for humans, products and services and why we shouldn’t.

Joe Macleod has been working in the mobile design space since 1998 and has been involved in a pretty diverse range of projects. At Nokia he helped develop some of the most streamlined packaging in the world, he created a hack team to disrupt the corporate drone of powerpoint, produced mobile services for pregnant women in Africa and pioneered lighting behaviour for millions of phones.

For the last four years he has been establishing ustwo as the UK’s best digital product studio, with 180 people globally in London, New York and Sweden, while also successfully building education initiatives, curriculums and courses on the back of the IncludeDesign campaign which launched in 2013. He now works independently on projects and is currently focusing on his work around Closure Experiences.

Joe will be talking about why we overlook endings across all aspects of our lives and why we shouldn’t.

Petra Barran

2018 - Passion, Talent, Collectives and Chocolate

Petra was a street food trader between 2005-2011 via Jimmy, the choc-mobile. She drove all over Britain in her wagon, making friends with fellow traders as she went. Then, in a Damascene moment, realised that if everyone got organised they could make great things happen. First came eat.st (2010) the hobby/street food collective, then the creation of KERB (2012) the business.

Kerb work’s with small independent traders, creating a hotbed for creativity and innovation in food. KERB and those they work with have been pushing the boundaries of street food and shaping the industry since they started. They help small businesses thrive, support them through their growth and provide a springboard from which they can build permanent businesses. This is good for business, good for the customer and good for the local economy.

Petra will be talking about her journey from Jimmy the choc-mobile to the creation of Kerb. The importance of culture, collective, nurturing raw talent, shaking things up and of course food.

Dr David Halpern

2018 - How small changes can make big differences

Dr David Halpern is the Chief Executive of the Behavioural Insights Team and Board Director. He has led the team since its inception in 2010. Prior to that, David was the founding Director of the Institute for Government and between 2001 and 2007 was the Chief Analyst at the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit. Before entering government, David held tenure at Cambridge and posts at Oxford and Harvard. He has written several books and papers on areas relating to behavioural insights and wellbeing, including Social Capital (2005), the Hidden Wealth of Nations (2010), and co-author of the MINDSPACE report.

David will be talking about behavioural economics, how psychology can be applied to today’s challenges and How Small Changes Can Make A Big Difference.

Tim Harford

2017 - Creativity & resilience in a tidy minded world

Tim is an economist, journalist and broadcaster. He is author of “Messy” and the million-selling “The Undercover Economist”, a senior columnist at the Financial Times, and the presenter of Radio 4’s “More or Less”. Tim has spoken at TED, PopTech and the Sydney Opera House and is a visiting fellow of Nuffield College, Oxford.

Tim was Economics Commentator of the Year 2014, winner of the Royal Statistical Society journalistic excellence award 2015, won the Society of Business Economists writing prize 2014-15, and the Bastiat Prize for economic journalism in 2006 and 2016.

Tim’s latest book, Messy: How To be Creative and Resilient in a Tidy-Minded World, celebrates the benefits that messiness has in our lives: why it’s important, why we resist it, and why we should embrace it instead. Using research from neuroscience, psychology, social science, as well as tales of inspiring people doing extraordinary things, It explains that the human qualities we value – creativity, responsiveness, resilience – are integral to the disorder, confusion, and disarray that produce them.

In Messy, you’ll learn about the unexpected connections between creativity and mess; understand why unexpected changes of plans, unfamiliar people, and unforeseen events can help generate new ideas and opportunities as they make you anxious and angry; and come to appreciate that the human inclination for tidiness – in our personal and professional lives, online, even in children’s play – can mask deep and debilitating fragility that keep us from innovation. The book is an exploration of the real advantages of mess in our lives.

‘It’s a very very good book, full of wise counterintuitions and clever insights.’ – Brian Eno

Anjali Ramachandran

2016 - Start Up & Social Enterprise

Anjali Ramachandran is a co-founder of Ada’s List, a global network for women in technology who want to change the industry and make it more diverse, equitable and inclusive.

She is also a board advisor at Angel Academe, an angel-investing group who invest in female entrepreneurs, and the editor of Other Valleys, a platform to highlight creativity and technology in the emerging markets. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a mentor to startups, and till recently was the Head of Innovation at PHD Media in London.

Katrine Marcal

2017 - Economics & do we have the right focus

Katrine Marçal is a Swedish economist, writer and journalist who has served as chief editorialist of the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet where she wrote on Swedish and international financial politics and feminism. Katrine wrote Who Cooked Adam Smith’s Dinner and will be talking about the relationship between economics and patriarchy.

Adam Smith, the founder of modern economics, believed that our actions stem from self-interest and the world turns because of financial gain. But every night Adam Smith’s mother served him his dinner, not out of self-interest but out of love. Today, economics focuses on self-interest and excludes our other motivations. It disregards the unpaid work of mothering, caring, cleaning and cooking and its influence has spread from the market to how we shop, think and date.

Katrine journeys from Adam Smith’s dinner table to the recent financial crisis and shows us how different and how much better things could be.

Julian Baggini

2017 - A rational skeptic in an irrational world

Julian is one of the UK’s best known philosophers and will be proposing that the contemporary West has become more and more dismissive of the power of reason and its ability to lead us to anything worthy of the name ‘truth’. Julian explains where reason comes up short and suggests that by understanding these shortcomings, we can become better thinkers and analysts.

Julian Baggin will be talking through ideas from his new book ,The Edge of Reason. A rational skeptic in an irrational world and will argue that we must recover our reason and reassess its proper place, neither too highly exalted nor completely maligned. Rationality does not require a sterile, scientistic worldview, it simply involves the application of critical thinking wherever thinking is needed. Addressing such major areas of debate as religion, science, politics, psychology, and economics, the author calls for commitment to the notion of a “community of reason,” where disagreements are settled by debate and discussion, not brute force or political power.

Alastair Humphreys

2017 - Grand Adventures

Adventure – something that’s new and exhilarating, outside your comfort zone. Adventures change you and how you see the world, and all you need is an open mind, bags of enthusiasm and boundless curiosity.

Alastair Humphreys is a British Adventurer, Author and Blogger. He spent over 4 years cycling round the world, a journey of 46,000 miles through 60 countries and 5 continents.

More recently Alastair has walked across southern India, rowed across the Atlantic Ocean, run six marathons through the Sahara desert, completed a crossing of Iceland, busked through Spain and participated in an expedition in the Arctic, close to the magnetic North Pole. He has trekked 1000 miles across the Empty Quarter desert and 120 miles round the M25 – one of his pioneering microadventures. He was named as one of National Geographic’s Adventurers of the year for 2012, since which he has been focusing on his microadventures.

A microadventure is close to home, cheap, simple, short and 100% guaranteed to refresh your life. A microadventure takes the spirit of a big adventure and squeezes it into a day or even a few hours.

You don’t need lots of time and money to meet a new challenge. Whether it’s sleeping on a hilltop or going for a wild swim, cycling a lap of the Isle of Wight or walking home for Christmas, it’s time you discovered something new about yourself and the world outside your window. Adventure is everywhere, every day and it is up to us to find it.

“Everyone should Microadventure” – Sir Richard Branson

Clara Gaggero Westaway

2017 - Design, Empathy & Optimism

Clara is an inventor, designer, user-oriented researcher and educator.

She cofounded Special Projects, a product design & invention studio that creates innovative products and services by fusing the physical and digital worlds. Her design experience spans from digital services to physical products. She has worked on projects including wearable technology for pro snowboarders, an internet connected calendar made entirely out of Lego, and designed the only mobile phone user manual to be featured in the Museum of Modern Art.

Her philosophy is to treat each project as a unique challenge, yet focus the process and the solutions on the user. Clara has designed for companies including the BBC, BlackBerry, Nokia, Samsung, Burton and global startups. Previously she ran the award winning design studio Vitamins.

Bethany Koby

2017 - Technology Will Save Us

Bethany Koby is one of the founders of Technology Will Save Us. An award winning business that provides make-it-yourself kits and digital tools to help kids (and the adults that love them) to make, play, code and invent using technology.

Bethany is a mum, CEO, designer, educator and art director. Bethany has been selected as one of the Designer’s that Matter by Wired Magazine, one of the Top 50 Creative Leaders by Creative Review and has spoken at TED Kids, Resonate and Maker Faire, to name a few.

The business started small, around the kitchen table, and has now built a company of 28 passionate designers, educators, engineers and problem solvers – obsessed with inspiring kids and empowering parents to become creators of technology.

Bethany will talk about her experience as a UK entrepreneur, education, technology and how we create brands, businesses and experiences that help imagine a more positive and collaborative future.

Beavertown Brewery

Why science fiction, music and art make great beer - 2017

Beavertown is one of the fastest growing and most exciting British breweries to emerge over the past 10 years. Originally set up by Logan Plant, Nick Dwyer was an early proponent of how the business expressed its creativity and innovation with its beer can designs. As the brewery’s Creative Director, Nick will talk about the vision and purpose that himself and Logan set for the business and how they ensure that creativity and quality continue to sit at the core of what they do.Now in their 6th year they continue to innovate, stimulate and create. Beer is what they make and love, and there are no plans to change that.

We will also be joined by some of the brewing team, who will talk us through a beer tasting session and introduce us to the wonders of Beavertown.

Robert Twigger

2017 - Micromastery

Robert Twigger is an award winning and acclaimed author, the underlying theme of all his work is adventure, but in broader terms than merely thrill seeking. He sees adventure in stretching himself and learning more, or studying others who have pushed themselves to become bigger and more accomplished people.

He believes in polymathy being the only knowledge approach possible for an adventurer- because the wider one’s knowledge base the better prepared you be to invent solutions.

Robert will talk through his latest book – Micromastery.

He will challenge the concept of we must be passionate about only one thing, that 10,000 hours of hard practice is needed to achieve mastery. And in fact most successful people, including Nobel prize winners, nurture multiple areas of knowledge and activity that feed their central subject.

Whether it’s making a perfect soufflé, dancing a tango or lighting a fire, when we take the time to cultivate small and quantifiable areas of expertise, we change everything. We become faster and more fearless learners, spot more creative opportunities, improve our brain health and boost our happiness. We see knowledge itself completely differently. The skills acquired in painting a door flawlessly or growing delicious chillies will unexpectedly transform your life.

Its about starting small. Starting specific. But start ing- and you’ll be on the path to mastery.

Emily Webber

2017 - How big change comes in small packages

Emily is an agile transformation specialist who works with organisations to help them make changes which makes them better.

Her background is in working with software development teams and she was previously the head of agile delivery at the Government Digital Service, which is seen as one of the most successful examples of organisational transformation, Emily now advises (government and non-government) on agile principles, techniques and ways to improve human and organisation wide dynamics.

She is an international public speaker, author and blogger on the topics of agile culture, people, community and diversity.

Emily will look at what we can all take away from an agile approach, providing real practical steps and how large scale change can be made through small changes, continual improvement and learning.

Clare Patey

The Empathy Museum

Clare is an award winning artist and curator who creates participatory installations, performances and exhibitions. She was the director of the Museum Of, The Ministry of Trying to Do Something About It and curated Feast on the Bridge for the Thames Festival.

Clare will be talking about empathy and The Empathy Museum. She will discuss the importance of looking at the world through the eyes of others, exploring how empathy can not only transform our personal relationships but tackle larger and more global issues such as prejudice, conflict and equality.

Russell Davies

2017 - Death to innovation

Russell was with us at our first OffGrid in 2016 and has agreed to come back and give us his “State of the nation” 12 months on.

Russell Davies is a writer and communications strategist. He has worked at advertising agencies such as Wieden + Kennedy and R/GA and for organisations including Nike, Apple, Microsoft, Honda and LOCOG. His most well-known work is probably the strategy development that led to Honda’s ‘Power Of Dreams’ campaign.

He is a Contributing Editor for Wired (UK) and has written for publications as diverse as The Idler, The Observer and Google’s Think Quarterly. He was Director of Strategy at the Government Digital Service – working out how a Digital Government integrates its products, services and marketing and is now Digital Strategy Director for the Co-op.

Dr Kate Stone

2017 - Animating objects

In 2015 Bloomberg Europe announced that Dr Kate Stone is going to shake up the world as we know it.

With a degree in Electronics and a PhD in Physics from Cambridge University; Dr Stone founded the award winning lab Novalia to explore the space where traditional print and conventional electronics converge, and has been living in that world ever since.

Some people expect the future to look like the film Minority Report, but Dr Stone believes the opposite – she wants to infuse our current analogue world with electronics so that everything looks like it always has…. except that it can come alive through interaction. Imagine a world where a teenager’s bedroom poster comes to life with the launch of a new album, or an LP that enables you to DJ from the actual record sleeve itself, or a notebook that actually plays musical notes? This is the world Dr Kate Stone is creating – by adding ‘digital soul’ to everyday flat surfaces that we take for granted, she is changing the world as we know it.

Using her patented interactive print Dr Kate Stone is adding interaction and capacitive touch to everything from hats and mandalas through to packaging and books – and connecting them to the internet, she is creating a new frontier for traditional industries that we already know and love, and who until now have been locked out of the technology age.

Alexandra Deschamps- Sonsino

2016 - IOT: Connecting products and experiences

Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino is an interaction designer, product designer and entrepreneur focused on the Internet of Things. She was named 2nd in Top 100 Internet of Things Thought Leaders (Onalytica, 2014), included in the Top 100 Influential Tech Women on Twitter (Business Insider, 2014) and Top 10 IOT Influencers you need to know about (Dataconomy, 2015).

Alexandra’s work with connected objects has sought to bring human connection to the forefront of design. As a leading voice in enabling connected innovation, Alexandra has been uniting the design and engineering community and has contributed to the national growth of grassroots innovation.

Robert Rowland Smith

2016 - Does the soul have ideas?

A Prize Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, Robert has been published on philosophy, literature and psychoanalysis and is the author of ‘Breakfast with Socrates’ and ‘Driving with Plato.’ He has written for The Independent and has recently undertaken talks on ‘How To Be An Entrepreneur’.

Philosopher and consultant Robert Rowland Smith will show us that entrepreneurship is about much more than just the pursuit of profit. It is a way of thinking that hopes to make the world a better place. In this lesson, we’ll discover that the skills of an entrepreneur – from managing risk to getting things done – can help all of us, whether we’re starting our own business or innovating within an existing organisation.

Adam Kucharski

2016 - Maths, betting, AI & humans

Adam Kucharski is an award winning young scientist and assistant professor at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, where he works on mathematical analysis of infectious disease oubreaks. He also write about science, and his articles have appeared in places like Scientific American, Nautilus, Wired, New Scientist, Financial Times and The Observer.

Adam will talk though his latest book, ‘The Perfect Bet’ which looks at probability, human behaviour and outcome through the lens of gambling and what we can learn from trying to “beat the house”.

A series of entertaining stories from casinos in Vegas to racecourses in Hong Kong, Adam looks at how maths, science and human behaviour can shed light on predicting outcomes and the world of AI.

Alexa Clay

2016 - Lessons in creativity from pirates, hackers & gangsters

Alexa Clay researches, writes and speaks on topics related to underground and grassroots innovation, technological change, economic transition and the power of misfits.

Her background is in ethnography, the history and philosophy of science, creative writing, (studying under poet Bob Creeley), and 18th and 19th century moral philosophy and economic theory.

Her book, The Misfit Economyargues that lessons in creativity, innovation, salesmanship, and entrepreneurship can come from surprising places: pirates, bootleggers, counterfeiters, hustlers, and others living and working on the margins of business and society.

Mark Shayler

2016 - Purpose & innovation

Mark Shayler works with companies and individuals to help them develop ideas and move on. He’s a founding partner of the Do Lectures. He also helps run Good for Nothing a collaborative group that deliver design and strategy work for good causes, for nothing.

His latest book Do Disrupt is about disruption. About doing things differently. About having ideas that will change the world. That will at least change your world. It is also about delivering those ideas. Do Disrupt is a workbook that will help you create ideas and take them from concept to market. It will encourage you to define your customer, identify the competition … and then out-smart them. You’ll find out why you need a chat with your Nan and a tape measure.

John Burgess

2016 - Cider Making & Community

Many London gardens have apple trees but most of the fruit is wasted. In 2010 John Burgess decided to do something about this waste of a fantastic natural resource. He leafleted neighbours offering to collect unwanted apples (or pears) to make cider. The response was overwhelming.

He collected 750 kilos of apples and pears and pressed the fruit to produce the first batch of London Glider – a clear, strong, still cider with a well-balanced fruity flavour and clean apple finish.

Nothing is wasted. Even the dry pulp left after each pressing is given to local farms to feed the sheep.

His “Orchard” continues to grow.

Ruth Anslow

2016 - Super Market Revolution

What if you had an idea of how supermarkets “should be” that you turned into a voice? And that voice became a rallying cry of thousands of people? And that crowd enabled you to open a chain of stores?
And those stores transformed supermarkets for the 21st century?
And more people were inspired to follow their own ideas of how it should be? That’s Ruth’s journey….

Ruth Anslow, Co-Founder of hiSbe Food CIC. She is in love with the idea that business can be a force for good, by serving the interests of the public and communities, not just a few shareholders and directors.

She’s not into destructive innovation that makes out-of-date business models obsolete. She believes that when we follow a vision of “how it should be,” we can transform whole industries.